In crypto buying and selling, the promise of huge good points typically comes with the chance of heavy losses. Over time, a number of high-profile crypto merchants have made headlines for his or her daring bets, solely to see their fortunes crumble when the market turned towards them.
From Bitcoin (BTC) to Ethereum (ETH), the crypto market has confirmed to be a double-edged sword. Tens of millions could be made or misplaced in simply hours, and merchants are left to take care of the fallout from their high-risk strikes. Listed here are the tales of three crypto merchants who worn out tens of millions:
James Wynn
James Wynn, a pseudonymous dealer on Hyperliquid, has develop into one of the mentioned figures on crypto Twitter (now X) attributable to his high-risk, high-reward buying and selling fashion.
Wynn began buying and selling on Hyperliquid in March 2025. He amassed important earnings by means of his daring buying and selling methods.
“Since I began trading this year on HyperLiquid I have made a total profit of $41,696,589.75 (on-chain). Next goal is $1bn. Not for the money. But for the legacy. Unlikely I’ll do it this cycle unless I went max degen on shorting the top, which I’m probably the only person with this kind of wealth who’s willing to turn it up on 40x leverage and put a significant % on the line,” Wynn mentioned on Could 9.
The dealer had a number of profitable trades. On Could 24, he booked a $25.18 million revenue from an extended place in kPEPE and $16.89 million from an extended Bitcoin place. Different notable trades included a $4.84 million revenue from Fartcoin (FARTCOIN) on Could 13 and a $6.83 million revenue from Official Trump (TRUMP) on Could 12.
Wynn’s earnings peaked at over $87 million in late Could. Nevertheless, this was short-lived, because the trades started to backfire quickly after. Wynn confronted a sequence of serious setbacks.
On Could 23, he misplaced $3.69 million from an extended Ethereum place and $1.59 million from a Sui (SUI) lengthy place. Two days later, on Could 25, he suffered a $15.86 million loss from a brief place in BTC.
“James Wynn has wiped out almost all his profits on Hyperliquid. It took him 70 days to go from 0 to $87 million+ in profit, and only 5 days to lose almost all the $87 million+ in profit,” Lookonchain posted on Could 28.
Regardless of shedding all of it, Wynn’s bets continued. The most important blow got here on Could 30, when an extended BTC place resulted in a lack of $37.41 million. Wynn’s losses prolonged into Could 31, with a further $1.20 million misplaced from one other BTC lengthy place.
Lastly, on June 5, Wynn misplaced $2.81 million on a BTC lengthy place, bringing his complete losses to $20.4 million.
“I closed my position. Defeated accepted. MM’s 1-0 Wynn,” he said.
On the time of writing, Wynn’s efficiency confirmed a win price of 40.48%, with 17 profitable trades out of 42.
Nameless ETH Whale
Wynn’s downfall is an element of a bigger development, with different crypto merchants additionally shedding tens of millions. In March 2025, an nameless cryptocurrency dealer, recognized by the pockets handle 0xf3F496C9486BE5924a93D67e98298733Bb47057c, suffered a staggering $308 million loss after a 50x leveraged lengthy place on ETH was liquidated.
The dealer had opened the place when ETH was buying and selling at $1,900, with a liquidation value of $1,877. Nevertheless, amid heightened market volatility pushed by international tariff issues, ETH’s value plummeted, liquidating 160,234 ETH.
Lookonchain reported that the whale had rotated all their Bitcoin holdings into this leveraged ETH commerce, amplifying the chance.
“Crazy! This whale has switched all of his long BTC positions to long ETH,” the publish learn.
Leveraged buying and selling, which makes use of borrowed funds to amplify each good points and losses, proved disastrous on this case, as a small value motion worn out the dealer’s total place.
In the meantime, the dealer has not opened any positions on Hyperliquid since late March.
Hui Yi
Whereas leveraged bets have led to huge monetary losses, they’ve additionally tragically resulted within the lack of life. In June 2019, Hui Yi, the co-founder and CEO of the cryptocurrency market evaluation platform BTE.TOP reportedly took his personal life.
Yi’s misery was believed to be attributable to his involvement in a failed 100x leveraged quick place on 2,000 Bitcoins. The acute leverage amplified his losses, making his place extremely susceptible to even minor value fluctuations.
There was additionally hypothesis that the two,000 Bitcoins may need belonged to shoppers. Some even urged that Yi could have faked his dying to keep away from compensation. Nevertheless, no proof supported these theories.
An ex-partner confirmed Yi’s dying. This tragic incident highlighted the psychological toll of leveraged buying and selling and the hazards of utilizing extreme borrowed funds within the risky crypto market.
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